Category Archives: OCC

I received a few OCC items at The Makeup Show, and today I have swatches of three lip tars from the new Plastic Passion collection. You can see all of the Plastic Passion lip tars at here on Sephora.com. For beautiful swatches of all six shades, check out Portrait of Mai’s post here.

Lip Tars, as you are probably aware, are an intensely pigmented liquid lipstick. I find that they work best when I apply the thinnest layer possible. I don’t generally experience bleeding with lip tars, but if you do, a clear lip liner or lip primer will help. Continue reading →

Milani and OCC each recently released clear lip liners (or should I call them lip pencils? I never know which to write). I purchased the Milani to try it out, then received the OCC as a press sample. So, I thought I’d do a comparison of those two items plus all the other clear lip liners & lip primers I own. This post is a comparison of the following six items:

I expect a lip primer / clear lip liner to do two things – prevent feathering & extend the weartime of my lipstick. All six of the items I tried prevented feathering (as tested on my hand, because lipstick rarely feathers on my lips). However, in terms of extending the wear of my lipstick, there’s a clear winner, a clear loser, and four items in the middle.

Best for extending weartine: Milani

The Milani Anti-Feathering lip liner has a soft texture. It creates a sort of “grippy” surface on the lips for your lipstick or gloss to adhere to. Although it’s marketed mostly as preventing feathering, it actually did the best job of extending the weartime of my lip products. Do note that if you use too much pressure or sharpen it to too fine of a point, the tip will break off.

I’ve seen the Milani liner at CVS stores and Walgreens stores for around $6, and it’s available on the Milani website for under $5. Recommended!

Worst for extending weartime: ELF

The E.L.F. lip lock pencil is only $3, but I still don’t think it’s worth it – it does nothing to extend the wear time of my lip products. On the positive side, it does prevent feathering and I like the packaging – it’s much easier to cover my lips with this size pencil than a slim pencil, plus it doesn’t need to be sharpened.

When I posted about this previously, a couple people commented that this product is meant to prevent feathering (which it does), rather than extend wear. I think the description on ELF’s website implies that it does both; but the intent really doesn’t matter. In the end, if you’re looking for a cheap anti-feathering pencil this is great; if you want something that extends wear, it’s not.

Average: OCC, Maybelline, NYX, Sally Hansen

I found the Maybelline & OCC pencils (the nearest two in the photo above) to be extremely similar – both are slightly hard, waxy pencils. Both prevent feathering and help lipstick last longer, but both are a bit difficult to use due to the thinness & texture of the pencil.

The NYX lip primer (farthest away in above photo) is a chubby pencil, so it’s easy to use. It looks light pink in the photo, but applies almost-clear; I can’t see it swatched on my skin, and it mutes the natural color of my lips just a little. This is a solid choice, just not my favorite.

The Sally Hansen plumping lip primer (review) might actually be my favorite of all of these products. The Milani does do a little bit of a better job at gripping the lip product, but the Sally Hansen makes up for it in being easy to apply. You can see that it’s in a jar in the first photo in this post, and that’s because it broke off a while back – not ideal, but it’s still easier to use than a skinny pencil. Do note that the “plumping” aspect shows up as a minty tingle, so this is not a good choice for those with sensitive lips.

Overall, I’d recommend the Milani, the Sally Hansen (as long as you don’t have sensitive lips), and the NYX. The ELF lip lock is also a good choice if you only care about preventing feathering, not about weartime. And I’d skip the Maybelline and OCC – they work, but the others are all easier to use.

Do you use any type of lip primer? I’d love to hear what works for you!

*I recieved the OCC pencil courtesy of the brand and The Makeup Show. I purchased all other products featured in this post. This post contains affiliate links. Please see my disclosure policy for more information.

I was suprised to realize that I own 15 concealers and three concealer palettes (the two L’oreal True Match concealer crayons – [review // $8.99 at Ulta] are not pictured below because they live in my desk at work; swatches are in my original review). Here’s a roundup – I’ll start with a description of each concealer, organized by type, with all swatches at the bottom.

At first glance, OCC’s brand new lip tar, Power Plant, does not look even remotely wearable. A shimmery pale green? What am I going to do with that? However, after playing with it, I am very happy to have it in my stash; not to wear alone, but to mix.

Although I’ve tried – and swatched – many of OCC’s creme-finish lip tars, Power Plant was my first experience with OCC’s new metallic lip tar formula. Like the creme finish lip tars, it has a peppermint scent (but no uncomfortable tingle on the lips), and like the creme finish lip tars, only a tiny amount should be used, or else the lip tar will feather and/or smear.

From a skin swatch, I had no idea what it would look like on the lips:

It turns out that alone, it looks – well – pretty bad. Not really wearable or flattering at all, even for most people who like nonstandard colors. It looks frosty and cancels out some of my natural lip color for a very unflattering look. I can imagine it being used quite effectively for an editorial look, however!

OCC Power Plant

But, then I tried mixing it. First, I grabbed the nearest lip tar, which happened to be Radiate – perhaps my favorite of the lip tars I own.

*I received Power Plant lip tar courtesy of OCC and The Makeup Show. I purchased the other products in this post. This post contains affiliate links. Please see my disclosure policy for more information.

As you may know, I’m a huge fan of the OCC lip tars – they’re one of my favorite long-wearing lip products. I’ve swatched five of the shades previously, and I have a sixth for you today! Black Dahlia is a new shade, and part of the Heroine Collection, which includes both lip tars and other products.

As I said in my last review, lip tars have a thin, fluid texture. They have a peppermint scent. They are basically a very, very pigmented liquid lipstick – the most pigmented lip product I have ever tried. When worn correctly, I have no bleeding or feathering, and they easily last for 6+ hours on me. However, if you apply too much, which is very easy to do, they are a complete mess – they’ll slip off your lips, on to your skin, where they will stain and look very messy. They must be applied with a lip brush. Some people find them drying, but I don’t – though I love matte lip products, and rarely find anything too drying.

Lip tars are now sold at Sephora – it looks like they have the whole shade range online, but I’ve only seen a selection in-store. At Sephora, lip tars are packaged in a clear vinyl pouch and include a small lipbrush and a card with instructions on how to use the lip tar.

I was quite skeptical that the lip brush would be any good, but I used it to apply the swatches below, and it worked quite well. It has an extremely short handle, but the brush head is a nice size for working with lip tar, and the brush hairs are nicely shaped. It feels like natural hair to me, but since all of OCC’s full size brushes are vegan, I’m sure it’s just an excellent synthetic.

When I swatched Black Dahlia on my arm, I realized it looked similar to MAC Rebel, so I’ve swatched them together so you can compare. AS you can see, they are very similar in color, but Black Dahlia is darker and seems to have more depth. The flash picture looks more color-accurate to me.

OCC Black Dahlia, MAC Rebel – flash

OCC Black Dahlia, MAC Rebel – natural light

Note that Black Dahlia has a different finish than the other lip tars I own – to borrow nail polish terms, the others have a creme finish, and Black Dahlia is a jelly. Or, you could say that the others are opaque, while Black Dahlia has a translucency to it. However, the texture and application seemed the same to me as the other lip tars I own.

I have two lip swatches. The first is a very light application – I used barely any lip tar, the smallest amount I could get to fully cover my lips. For the second, I added another thin coat after the first coat had set.

Black Dahlia – one layer

Black Dahlia – two layers

As you can see, this is not a forgiving shade – every last texture imperfection on my lips is clearly visible. Of course, it looks much better from further away, but some patchiness is still visible.

Also note that Black Dahlia stained my arm – I’m used to swatches staining, but this was a much more persistant stain than most. I usually remove stubborn swatches with straight jojoba oil, then wash my arm with hand soap, then towel dry. This method gets almost all stains off easily – but here’s the result after one round:

Black Dahlia / Rebel stains

After a second round of oil / soap / towel, the Rebel stain is completely gone and the Black Dahlia stain has diminished significantly, but is still quite visible.

Of course, one doesn’t usually get product on one’s arm in the normal course of wearing lipstick! Staining is both a negative and a positive in my opinion. The downside is that it means that if you accidentally go outside your lip line when applying the product, it might stain and thus be difficult to get a clean lip outline. The upside, of course, is that the product will stain your lips and last very well.

Overall, I love Black Dahlia lip tar. I love the color SO much, and I love the slightly translucent quality. However, it is tricky to work with – more so even than other lip tars – so I would only recommend it if you are willing to spend extra time working with it.